Multi-Objective Synthesis of NFC-Transponder Systems Based on PEEC Method

he near-field communication (NFC) technique finds wide applications in many aspects of modern life, e.g., contactless payment systems or authentication. Regardless of the application, typically, the requirements on the antenna structure are manifold. Frequently, limitations in the available space make the antenna design quite challenging. Beside geometrical limitations, also the matching of the antenna structure to the analog front end of the NFC transponder IC has to be taken into account. Furthermore, the NFC antenna together with the connected IC has to fulfill specific standardized values. In this paper, the optimization of an NFC antenna structure including the needed matching circuit in the multi-objective sense is proposed. Due to its simplicity and the consequently reduced computational effort, the partial-element electric circuit (PEEC) method is applied to carry out the needed field computation in the so-called NFC operating volume. Furthermore, the PEEC method offers the possibility of simply connecting lumped components to the antenna structure within the numerical analyses, which enables the optimization of the matching circuit parallel to the optimization of the antenna structure. The optimization relies on a stochastic optimization strategy, namely, the firefly algorithm (FFA). In this paper, an extended version of the general FFA is applied.